Chernobyl Remembered

"Everything that could be destroyed had been. The entire water coolant system was gone. The right-hand side of the reactor hall had been completely destroyed, and on the left the pipes were just hanging. That was when I realised that Khodemchuk was definitely dead. The place where I was told he'd been standing was in ruins. The huge turbines were still standing, but everything around them was rubble. He must have been buried under that. From where I stood I could see a huge beam of projected light flooding up into infinity from the reactor. It was like a laser light, caused by the ionisation of the air. It was light-bluish, and it was very beautiful. I watched it for several seconds. If I'd stood there for just a few minutes I would probably have died on the spot because of gamma rays and neutrons and everything else that was spewing out. But Tregub yanked me around the corner to get me out the way. He was older and more experienced."

Human beings are awfully fragile, and yet we are very happy to work with things that can do a great deal of damage to us, and the things around us.

We're happy to control great power, but just as soon as we make a mistake or misunderstand something, then a nasty little bit of history is written, and some new statistics are recorded.

Lets face facts – we are perfectly capable of destroying ourselves, and not just in large quantities. It would be a good idea to learn from the Chernobyl accident, and this lesson doesn't just apply to nuclear physics.